Question

Spot the error in the following sentence.

The Pickerel frog should be avoided as the secretions from their skin are lethal to animals and irritating to humans.

• A. avoided
• B. their
• C. lethal to animals
• D. irritating

Hint:

Check whether the pronoun matches the number of its antecedent, "The Pickerel frog".

Answer 1

The Correct Option is B

The sentence is about a single animal, "The Pickerel frog", and later uses a pronoun to refer back to it. We check each underlined part for a grammar error.

1. avoided: This verb correctly follows "should be" in the passive voice. No error here.
2. their: "Their" is a plural possessive pronoun. It is being used to refer back to "The Pickerel frog", which is singular. A singular noun needs a singular pronoun, "its", not the plural "their". This is the error.
3. lethal to animals: This phrase correctly describes the effect of the secretions on animals. No error here.
4. irritating: This word correctly describes the effect on humans, in line with the rest of the sentence. No error here.

The mistake is the pronoun "their", which does not agree in number with its singular antecedent "The Pickerel frog". The correct pronoun would be "its".

Let's summarize:

• A pronoun must match its antecedent in number, singular pronoun for a singular noun.
• "The Pickerel frog" is one animal, so it needs "its", not "their".

So the error is in the word "their", making option (b) the correct answer.